136 TEN YEARS OF GAME-KEEPING 
and nine out of ten will be content to stay at home 
all through the winter. 
It is obvious that one hare eats as much food 
as one rabbit. Yet if there are twenty hares and 
twenty rabbits living on the same farm, the rabbits 
soon may bring upon their heads the wrath of man, 
while the hares, though they eat probably a greater 
quantity of food—that is, do more damage—provoke 
no murmur of complaint. So it seems logical that 
if rabbits, even in small numbers, are injurious to 
the welfare of woods and farming interests, the 
same quantity of hares must inflict at least an equal 
amount of damage. But this is not so in fact. 
Rabbits prefer to feed as close as possible to their 
lodgings, and make a clean sweep as they go, clear- 
ing a crop before them, as do sheep in a fold. 
Hares, on the other hand, move about, and take 
a nibble here and there, and unless they are very 
numerous, the only material damage they do is to 
clear a few roads through the corn in summer, and 
to gnaw a few roots in winter. In the latter case, 
they are so considerate as to stick to a root till 
finished, instead of chipping fresh ones, and so 
causing them to rot. 
Fortunately, those who preside over farming 
interests, whether tenant-farmers or bailiffs, are not 
given to expressing concern for what their eyes do 
not see; and even if a farmer does complain that 
hares are nibbling his wheat in spring, when it is 
